


Don't Be Surprised

by Hyliare



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Gen, Gen or Pre-Slash, M/M, Mary-less AU, Post-Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-25
Updated: 2014-04-25
Packaged: 2018-01-20 19:28:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1522826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hyliare/pseuds/Hyliare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You wanted to bake me a surprise cake."</p>
<p>John sat it down in the sink and tossed the floral pot holders to the side. Honestly, I was impressed by how acrid the air in the flat had become—or, rather, I was impressed by my mind’s ability to ignore it while deep in thought. I stared at him through the grey haze and tried to suppress the burning sensation in my eyes. He was waving in front of his face to clear a breathable pocket.</p>
<p>"Well, I didn't think an entire surprise party would be terribly appropriate. Any surprise, really, seemed a misguided gesture at best. Food was a safe decision."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Be Surprised

“It was meant to be a surprise.”

“You wanted to bake me a surprise cake.”

John sat it down in the sink and tossed the floral pot holders to the side. Honestly, I was impressed by how acrid the air in the flat had become—or, rather, I was impressed by my mind’s ability to ignore it while deep in thought. I stared at him through the grey haze and tried to suppress the burning sensation in my eyes. He was waving in front of his face to clear a breathable pocket.

“Well, I didn’t think an entire surprise party would be terribly appropriate. Any surprise, really, seemed a misguided gesture at best. Food was a safe decision.”

“…Right.”

“And it’s not like you’ve any friends I could have invited to a party. Spectacular job pushing them all away—Consider that high praise, I’m a bit of an expert.”

“Aren’t you.”

“I considered cleaning the flat, but you did the washing up before you left and getting things _dirty_ just to give you the gift of cleaning them is counterintuitive at best and idiotic at worst, and the experiments I need to run this week are actually quite clean and self-contained, so it would be pointless to use them as an excuse.”

“No, yeah. Makes sense.”

“I could hardly get you a _card_.”

There was still a thick tension between us, gathering in the triangulation of him and I and the smoking abomination he had pulled out of the oven. It was a shame, really. Everything had gone very well up until the point of combustion. I’d weighed every ingredient, mixed them to precisely the right viscosity, and calibrated the oven’s temperature. I had even asked Mrs Hudson for her opinion on hand-flouring the pan versus using a store-bought spray.

I’d been looking forward to the results, and I’d found the process interesting enough to warrant a bit of cataloguing-work. One thing led to another. I got…distracted. I was comparing the simplified chemical compositions of buttercream and royal icing when John arrived. I was supposed to have the cake out of the oven by the time John arrived. In fact, I was supposed to have the cake cooled, sliced, crumb-coated, filled, stacked, and frosted by the time John arrived.

The cake was still in the oven, which wouldn’t have been much of a problem had the oven not still been turned on, but it was. It was turned on, and pouring out an acrid carbon smoke.

John had appeared behind a marble-topped island with two porcelain bowls of fats and sugars with a violent swear, pulling his cardigan up over his nose and mouth as he stomped toward the stainless steel convection number in the corner.

“ _Oh_.”

And there we were, back at Baker Street, a few hours lost to the care of knowledge I might not ever use again (but I might have—but I _would_ have, had the first time gone even remotely well). John had sighed and asked what it was, whether it was organic, whether it was toxic. I’d told him it was a cake, and he’d actually _laughed_.

He sighed again, then, but didn’t laugh.

“ _Why_ did you want to bake me a surprise cake, Sherlock?”

“I…It—…For many reasons.”

Which was true. I could have given him the main reason, but I felt I’d spent enough time rambling that afternoon. He didn’t smile at my rambling rants like he used to. He often just rolled his eyes.

“Give me one.”

“…One reason?”

“Yes.”

I had to think of a good one, I could see as much in his face. John was in that delicate mood of his, between amused and annoyed and angry, perched on a three-sided pyramid and waiting for some external force to push him down one of the slopes, so he wouldn’t have to decide himself.

I nodded, and chose the only reason that mattered. The main truth:

“It was an apology. Part of an apology. _The_ apology.”

Then, a voice that sounded completely identical to mine but couldn’t possibly _be_ mine, since I hadn’t given my throat any additional permission to speak, added a quiet, “I’m sorry.”

His chest swelled in a deep breath—then he coughed from the lingering smoke and waved again in front of his face.

It was a good one, but the frown said it wasn’t good enough. John opened his mouth to speak and _again_ —“I’m sorry.” I had no idea who kept interjecting.

He shook his head. “What are you sorry for, exactly?”

Was that a trick question? What wasn’t I sorry for, at that point? It would have been easier to answer in the negative. I wasn’t sorry I’d attempted baking, at least. But John wanted something specific. He wanted another reason, for a different action. Another cause for another effect.

“I’m sorry…I left.”

There was no more point in obscuring it. He knew what I was sorry for, or I assumed he did. How could he not? I simply chose to say it in the simplest terms, in hopes he might finally believe me.

“You wanted to bake me a cake…because you faked your death.”

“Because I left. Because I watched you touch my headstone. Because I watched you put flowers there. Because I jumped, after you said, ‘no.’ Because I forced you to move out of your home—”

“You didn’t—”

“Because I let my parents know the truth. Because the way I announced my return to you was _unacceptable_. Because I insulted your frankly poor choice of facial hair. Because I missed two birthdays.”

I could have gone on (for a small while, at least), but his flinch stopped me. He was staring at the blackened pan. He looked up, eyes red-rimmed from the pollution but clear in their determination. More questions, then. I didn’t mind. I wanted to answer them. Any question John had, I would answer, now that it was possible.

“ _Did_ you miss them? Really?”

I blinked, and a small fraction of the confusion I felt in the moment must have shown on my face, because John shrugged and repeated himself, with a bit of extra clarification.

“Did you _miss_ two of my birthdays? When that day went by, did you…feel bad? Did you even _actually_ notice? Did you miss them only because you weren’t here, or because you _missed_ them? Because you missed _me?_ ” He paused, I suppose for gravitas. “Did you miss them?”

“Of course I did.”

His lips twisted a bit. If I had listened more intently, I think I might have heard his molars squeak as they clenched together.

I took in a slow breath and held it. “You don’t believe me.”

“You don’t keep track of dates.”

“I keep track of that one.”

“Why?”

It was an expected question, but it stung far, far more than I could have anticipated.

“…Because you don’t. I can forget all the others, because you will—would, inevitably, remind me of them. You never reminded me of that one, so I had to keep track. So I _do_ keep track.”

“So, it was a surprise birthday cake?”

“…Of sorts. Yes.”

“In December. Sherlock, it’s nearly _Christmas_.”

“Does that make you uncomfortable on a religious level?”

“My birthday is—”

“March 31st, 1971. 22:57. I know. I _did_ see your birth certificate.”

John let out a puff of air that might have been considered a laugh, just barely a laugh. He reached back to pull the tap and quell the last of the smoke rising from the would-be dessert in the sink. The pan hissed as it gave up the last of its ghost.

“…I’m sorry.” It was me, that time. I said it. I meant it.

His shoulders slowly dropped, hand tensing as it shut off the water and smacked gently down to the countertop.

“John, I’m so—”

“You know, most people _do_ get a card. In addition to everything else. There’s usually a party, a cake, _and_ a card. And ice cream, in the freezer.”

He turned his whole body toward me, destroying the triangulation in favour of a single straight line.

“And yeah, I did the washing up this morning, but you could have swept up all this _bloody_ flour.”

“After. I was going to, aft—”

“You could have bought me a new pair of socks. A tie, at least.”

It was only then that I realized he was smiling. The defensive pressure building in my chest disappeared with the breath I’d been holding in for too long. I hesitated for a single second, then smiled back. “You don’t wear ties.”

“I could start.”

Finally, the silence between us was just silence. It wasn’t tense, it was comfortable. It was normal. John did laugh, then, quietly into his chest. He sighed and the sound was bright. He shook his head and looked at me until I was compelled to speak.

“This was a disaster of a not-birthday.”

“Mm.”

“How can I make it up to you?”

“…Well, the birthday dinner is a pretty long-standing tradition.”

I looked at the oven. A sooty apparition still lingered in it, which I was fairly certain would impart all manner of unpleasant flavours until I figured out how it was meant to be cleaned.

“Dinner _out_ , Sherlock. You treat the person to dinner, on their birthday. Restaurant of their choice.”

“Ah. Of course. And you’ve chosen already?”

“Angelo’s always talking about the tiramisu…That’s cake. More or less.”

“…More or less.”

John pushed away from the sink, still in his coat and shoes from work. “Get dressed, then, and make sure you bring your wallet so it’s _you_ treating me, not Angelo. And not _Mycroft_. Bring cash!”

I dressed, something else I‘d meant to have done before John’s arrival, and met him beside the kitchen table. Most of the flour was in a small pile now. He caught me staring and cocked a brow. “I was surprised, if that’s what you’re wondering. Nothing like a burnt cake ten days before someone’s half-half-birthday to surprise them.”

That wasn’t what had me struck, but it was good to know.

I buttoned my coat and decided to test the waters. “But you did like it?”

“Of course I did.”

“Even though it was burnt.”

“It’s the thought that counts, Sherlock. I can’t imagine you’ve never heard that one…And you put more thought into that than…It had a lot of thought. I liked it.” John’s gaze narrowed a bit. “You’ll have to bake a replacement, though, when I’m present to keep the flat from burning down.”

“You said it was the thought that counted.”

“Sure, but now I’m curious.”

I snorted and started down the stairs, leaving John to follow. My foot had just touched the ground floor when he stopped me with a hand on the shoulder. “I don’t mind doing it again,” I said, “but I’m not cleaning that oven, I don’t have the _time_ to—” I made a mistake in glancing back. His eyes were still pink from the smouldering surprise, and probably would be for the rest of the night, but they were _kind_. They were kind in the way I’d grown so used to seeing, the way I’d come to expect, then to detest expecting, then to accept that I’d never see again.

My second shoe struck the first and sent me stumbling into the wall with very little elegance. John caught my arm fast enough to keep my head safe—my temple barely brushed the paint. He stayed two steps up and smiled. Not at the fall (maybe never at another fall, ever again). Just at me.

“Sherlock. Thank you.”

“John.”

He let my arm go. I reached out and took his.

“Happy birthday.”

His smile grew, and the bitterness that clung to its edges faded away to the distant background. “Thank you.”

 


End file.
